1822.] 
healthful condition of the harbour; 
that, during their residence, they could 
never trace any infectious scent ; that 
in the streets the best aired and kept 
the cleanest, the disorder raged the 
most; and that 300 fishermen, lodged 
in the most unhealthy quarter of the 
city, had escaped the dreadful scourge, 
merely from living in seclusion. In 
short, they represent Barcelona, where 
the plague first made its appearance, as 
one of the most healthy places they 
have known. 
According to the physicians, the 
contagion was brought over in vessels 
fromthe Havannah. Among other in- 
stances, they refer to one called the 
Grand Turk, the captain of which 
having brought his family on-board for 
a day or two, saw them all perish, on 
their return to Barcelonetta. In the 
Spanish polacre, Nuestra Senora del 
Carmen, a poor passenger taken on- 
board for charity, from Alicant, died 
the day after his landing at Barcelona. 
The French brig, the Josephine, from 
intercourse with other vessels in the 
Toad, was so infected as to endanger 
the lives of the second captain, the 
lieutenant and the sailors, and it be- 
came necessary to place the vessel in 
quarantine. : 
Hereupon, the local authorities gave 
orders for removing the sick into laza- 
rettos, and for removing some sus- 
pected ships to a distance, and for 
sinking others, but this order the peo- 
ple refused to obey. Atone time they 
carried away, by viclence, some sick 
men that the soldiers were conveying 
to the lazarettos. The plague then 
continued its ravages, till the officers of 
government, and half of the inhabi- 
tants, were obliged to flee. During 
100 days, from the last week in August 
to the 2d of December, of 70,000 inha- 
bitants that remained, one-third had 
caught the fever, and1700died. Chil- 
dren of tender age, women, persons in 
easy circumstances, those subject to 
excessive perspiration, or such as had 
been infected before, suffered the least, 
but these exceptions were not abso- 
lute, especially in the last case. 
The French physicians, in tracing 
the contagion from street to street, and 
from house to house, found the slightest 
communication frequently sufficient to 
transmit the infection. All the se- 
questered places, as the citadel, the 
prisons, &c. weresecure. ‘The malady 
Novelties of Foreign Literature. 
239 
is considered to be transmissible, by 
contact, either with persons or with 
household goods, merchandize, &e. 
and at short distances, by the air that 
environs the objects of infection. 
M. Rochoux, a member of the same 
medical commission, (sent into Spain 
by the French government,) has not 
concurred with the testimony of his 
colleagues, in their researches to detect 
and explain the contagion ; but, though 
he separated from them, his attention 
was no less engaged in the speculation. 
The facts, experiments, and arguments, 
which he collected, he has presented to 
the public, in a ‘ Dissertation on the 
Yellow Typhus.” 
He allows it to be of a contagious 
nature; a deleterious principle, readily 
transmissible by contact with indivi- 
duals, or articles of clothing and mer- 
chandise. He also recommends insu- 
lation, and considers it as a preserva- 
tive, but differs from his associates on 
two essential points, the nature and 
the origin of the malady. He insists 
that it is not the yellow fever of the 
West Indies, but a species of typhus, 
analogous to that which often breaks 
out in prisons and hospitals, He calls 
it the yellow fever, being, like other 
descriptions of typhus, a local malady 
not brought to Barcelona, but formed 
and propagated there by a train of cir- 
cumstances. 
M. Rochoux endeavours to shew, 
that the contagion appeared first in the 
shipping, and thence spread into the 
city and Barcelonetta, withmore or less 
malignity, as the distance was greater, or 
otherwise, from the point of departure. 
He denies that it was imported from 
the Havannah, alleges that it is un- 
known in the island of Cuba, and that 
it was known in Europe prior to the 
discovery of America; in favour of this 
opinion, he quotes Hippocrates. 
To the above he adds, as facts, that 
the symptoms of this disease have been 
well marked and related, as produced 
at Barcelona, in the 14th, 15th, and 
16th, centuries. 
The causes of the contagion the 
doctor discovers in the unhealthful 
condition of the port; and he points 
out the connexion between the disease, 
and the great number of vessels 
crowded together, in circumstances 
constantly found to be dangerous in hot 
seasons. 
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